Digital Commons Network^™

The Information Era Threatens Privacy: A Comparative Study Of Electronic Money’S Privacy Policies And Privacy Laws, Guanru Liu

GUANRU LIU

This thesis consists of an analysis of electronic money (e-money), e-money’s privacy policies and relevant privacy laws. The value of information and the development of technology enhance the risk of privacy violations in the information era. Consumer privacy interests with respect to e-money are governed in part by the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA) in Canada and by the European Union’s Data Protection Directive. The analysis is directed at whether the privacy policies of three kinds of e-money – Octopus Card, PayPal and MasterCard – comply with the spirit and letter of these laws. In light of …

How Can Open Source And Closed Source Software Business Structures Mutually Exist, Yugank Goyal, Padmanabha Ramanujam

Yugank Goyal

The phenomenon of producing Open Source Software based on unconstrained access to source code and the swift growth of the open source business structure of producing software fuelled by Linux Operating System and Apache Web Server have raised important questions, which are of immense scholastic interest. Accordingly many scholars in the last few years have endeavoured to clarify as to why thousands of top-quality programmers contribute freely to an open source product which is a public good. However, there has hardly been any attempt to explain how open source and closed source business structure of producing software can coexist. This …

The Evolution Of The Us Drm Debate, 1987-2006, Bill D. Herman

Bill D. Herman

Scholars who discuss copyright often observe that the voices for stronger copyright have more financial and political capital than their opponents and thus tend to win in Congress. While the playing field is still quite slanted toward stronger copyright, the politics around the issue are much messier and less predictable. This study, a detailed political and legislative history of the major proposals regarding copyright and digital rights management from 1987 to 2006, illustrates how this policy dynamic has changed so drastically. In 1987, there was no organized opposition to copyright’s expansion. By 2006, however, there was a substantial coalition of …

Social Media And Legal Ethics, Jonathan I. Ezor

Jonathan I. Ezor

A presentation on the legal issues arising out of attorney use of social media services, including for electronic discovery

Rationales For And Against Regulatory Involvement In Resolving Internet Interconnection Disputes, Rob Frieden

Rob Frieden

Internet Service Providers (“ISPs”) provide end users with access to and from the Internet cloud. In addition to providing the first and last mile carriage of traffic, ISPs secure upstream access to sources of content telecommunications carriers typically a paid (transit), or barter (peering) basis. Because a single ISP operates in two separate segments of traffic routing, the terms and conditions of network interconnection and the degree of marketplace competition can vary greatly. In this double-sided market, ISPs typically have many transit and peering opportunities upstream to content providers, but downstream end users may have a limited choice of ISP …

The Times They Are A-Changin’: The “Sexting” Problem And How The Intrusiveness Of A Cell Phone Search Determines The (Un)Constitutionality Of Suspicion-Based And Suspicionless Searches In The Public School Setting, Andrew T. Moore

Andrew T Moore

In the past decade cell phone use amongst teenagers has gone from luxury to perceived necessity. With the expanded abilities of modern cell phones, students are able to easily participate in social sexual behavior such as sending explicit images of themselves or others to other cell phone users, an activity known as “sexting.” While schools may want to do all they can to eradicate this behavior, school administrators must not violate the constitutional rights of their students in the process of doing so. When a school administrator comes to suspect “sexting” behavior, he or she must follow existing Fourth Amendment …

Right To Information Identity, Elad Oreg

Elad Oreg

Inspired by the famous Warren&Brandeis conceptualization of the "right to privacy", this article tries to answer a modern conceptual lacuna and present the argument for the need to conceptualize and recognize a new, independent legal principle of a "right to information-identity". This is the right of an individual to the functionality of the information platforms that enable others to identify and know him and to remember who and what he is. Changes in technology and social standards make the very notion of identity increasingly fluid, transforming the way it is treated and opening new and fascinating ways of relating to …

Skewed Incentives: How Offshore Drilling Policies Fail To Induce Innovation To Reduce Social And Environmental Costs, Gaia J. Larsen

Gaia Larsen Esq.

The accident at the Deepwater Horizon platform in the Gulf of Mexico in April of 2010 showed the potentially catastrophic damage associated with offshore oil drilling. It also highlighted both the technological advances that have made drilling in deeper and more dangerous waters feasible and affordable, and the lack of similar advances in technology to prevent harm resulting from such drilling. In light of that disaster and current debate over offshore oil drilling, this article looks at the failure of current policies to adequately incentivize investment in innovation to reduce the environmental and social costs associated with offshore drilling. It …

Electronic Discovery: A Survey Of E-Discovery, Its Effect On Corporate Constitutional Rights And Why Corporations May Receive The Fifth Amendment Privilege Against Self-Incrimination During Parallel Civil And Criminal Litigation, Percy Arnell King

Percy Arnell King Esq.

Advancing technology has created more places to seek out relevant information than ever before which, has created a burden for corporations tasked with retaining this information to comply with applicable laws and the prospect of civil or criminal litigation. This article explores how the modern trend of storing information electronically and subsequent electronic discovery allowed in parallel civil and criminal trials is inherently unfair to corporations. Furthermore, corporations have been granted several rights derived from the Bill of Rights, and should also receive the Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination.

New Frontiers Of Reprogenetics: Snp Profile Collection And Banking And The Resulting Duties In Medical Malpractice, Issues In Property Rights Of Genetic Materials, And Liabilities In Genetic Privacy., Stephanie Sgambati

Stephanie Sgambati

ABSTRACT

Single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) represent the portions of our genetic makeup where human differ from each other. Mapping an individual’s profile creates a DNA fingerprint entirely unique to that individual. The primary purpose for the creation of SNP profiles has been validation of medical techniques used in reproductive medicine that require researchers to be able to definitively determine which embryo makes which baby- thus matching DNA fingerprints from infants to those from embryos. In spite of this seemingly narrow use, the potential value of the information contained in the SNP profile is enormous.

In this paper, I explore how …

Association Of Molecular Pathology Meets Therasense: Analyzing The Unenforceability Of Isolated-Sequence-Related Patents For Upenn, Columbia, Nyu, Yale, And Emory, Sam S. Han Ph.D.

Sam Han

37 CFR 1.56 requires disclosure of material information to the United States Patent and Trademark Office ("USPTO" or "PTO") when applying for a patent. This duty is imposed on (1) each inventor; (2) each attorney or agent who prepares or prosecutes the application; and (3) every other person who is substantively involved in the preparation or prosecution of the application and who is associated with the inventor, with the assignee or with anyone to whom there is an obligation to assign the application. Thus, for academic institutions, those who handle patent prosecution for the institution are bound by this duty …

Metadata Discovery After The 2006 Amendments To The Federal Rules Of Civil Procedure: Did The Amendments Work?, Ryan J. Rawlings

Ryan J. Rawlings

In 2003, the Civil Rules Advisory Committee determined electronically stored information discovery required a national, uniformly applied rule, and proposed amendments to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure explicitly addressing electronically stored information. The electronically stored information amendments to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure became effective December 01, 2006. It is time to ask, did the amendments achieve the Committee’s goal to create a uniform system of electronic discovery? This Note will review the amendments to Rule 34 and the amendments’ effect on metadata discovery.

The Myth And Reality Of Dilution, Sandra L. Rierson

Sandra L Rierson

Statutory dilution claims are traditionally justified on the theory that even non-confusing uses of a famous trademark (or similar mark) can nonetheless minutely dilute the source-identifying power of the targeted trademark. The assumption of both the original federal dilution statute enacted in 1995 as well as its substantial enlargement in 2006 is that the source-identifying capacity of a trademark is akin to a glass of water: spill a drop here, spill a drop there and eventually your glass is empty. This Article advances three claims. First, statutory dilution erroneously assumes that the source-identifying function of a trademark is a rivalrous …

Should Posts On Social Networking Websites Be Considered "Printed Publications" Under Patent Law?, Xiaojing Li

Xiaojing Li

The emergence of social networking websites imposes a challenge to patent law. Courts should not make a blanket assumption that everything posted on social websites constitute a printed publication. Rather, courts should adopt a refined multiple factor test to help the analysis. This proposal would result in a balance between private and public interests in an invention, and therefore help achieve the ultimate goal of patent law.

Online Investigations And The Americans With Disabilities Act: The Resurgence Of Overbroad And Ineffectual Mental Health Inquiries In Character And Fitness Evaluations, Bernice M. Bird

Bernice M. Bird

Nationally, state board bar examiners’ interest to inquire into mental health has been a hotly contested issue invoking the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) for the last two decades. After the enactment of the ADA in 1990 a floodgate of litigation resulted in a litany of publications, all surrounding the issue of whether mental health based inquiries into character and fitness violated the ADA. Consequently, narrowly tailored mental health inquiries into specific disorders emerged as the trend in a majority of jurisdictions. This comment analyzes whether fitness boards' mental health inquiries among social networking profiles may cause the resurgence of …

The Protection Of Digital Information And Prevention Of Its Unauthorized Access And Use In Criminal Law, Carrie Leonetti, Moonho Song

Carrie Leonetti

There are a number of valuable intangible properties that do not have specific legislation devoted to their criminal regulation and protection, which poses a vexing problem for the world’s legal systems, which have had an unsatisfactory track record in protecting valuable information over the course of the previous century, giving rise to the need for laws that specifically address issues related to the protection of the integrity of digital information-storage systems. This Article focuses on the protection of these intangibles, when they are stored within a computer system, from their unauthorized use by, or interference from, third parties.

The Article …

The Protection Of Digital Information And Prevention Of Its Unauthorized Access And Use In Criminal Law, Carrie Leonetti, Moonho Song

Carrie Leonetti

There are a number of valuable intangible properties that do not have specific legislation devoted to their criminal regulation and protection, which poses a vexing problem for the world’s legal systems, which have had an unsatisfactory track record in protecting valuable information over the course of the previous century, giving rise to the need for laws that specifically address issues related to the protection of the integrity of digital information-storage systems. This Article focuses on the protection of these intangibles, when they are stored within a computer system, from their unauthorized use by, or interference from, third parties.

The Article …

The Protection Of Digital Information And Prevention Of Its Unauthorized Access And Use In Criminal Law, Carrie Leonetti, Moonho Song

Carrie Leonetti

There are a number of valuable intangible properties that do not have specific legislation devoted to their criminal regulation and protection, which poses a vexing problem for the world’s legal systems, which have had an unsatisfactory track record in protecting valuable information over the course of the previous century, giving rise to the need for laws that specifically address issues related to the protection of the integrity of digital information-storage systems. This Article focuses on the protection of these intangibles, when they are stored within a computer system, from their unauthorized use by, or interference from, third parties.

The Article …

The Protection Of Digital Information And Prevention Of Its Unauthorized Access And Use In Criminal Law, Carrie Leonetti, Moonho Song

Carrie Leonetti

There are a number of valuable intangible properties that do not have specific legislation devoted to their criminal regulation and protection, which poses a vexing problem for the world’s legal systems, which have had an unsatisfactory track record in protecting valuable information over the course of the previous century, giving rise to the need for laws that specifically address issues related to the protection of the integrity of digital information-storage systems. This Article focuses on the protection of these intangibles, when they are stored within a computer system, from their unauthorized use by, or interference from, third parties.

The Article …

The Protection Of Digital Information And Prevention Of Its Unauthorized Access And Use In Criminal Law, Carrie Leonetti, Moonho Song

Carrie Leonetti

There are a number of valuable intangible properties that do not have specific legislation devoted to their criminal regulation and protection, which poses a vexing problem for the world’s legal systems, which have had an unsatisfactory track record in protecting valuable information over the course of the previous century, giving rise to the need for laws that specifically address issues related to the protection of the integrity of digital information-storage systems. This Article focuses on the protection of these intangibles, when they are stored within a computer system, from their unauthorized use by, or interference from, third parties.

The Article …

The Protection Of Digital Information And Prevention Of Its Unauthorized Access And Use In Criminal Law, Carrie Leonetti, Moonho S

Carrie Leonetti

There are a number of valuable intangible properties that do not have specific legislation devoted to their criminal regulation and protection, which poses a vexing problem for the world’s legal systems, which have had an unsatisfactory track record in protecting valuable information over the course of the previous century, giving rise to the need for laws that specifically address issues related to the protection of the integrity of digital information-storage systems. This Article focuses on the protection of these intangibles, when they are stored within a computer system, from their unauthorized use by, or interference from, third parties.

The Article …

The Protection Of Digital Information And Prevention Of Its Unauthorized Access And Use In Criminal Law, Carrie Leonetti, Moonho Song

Carrie Leonetti

There are a number of valuable intangible properties that do not have specific legislation devoted to their criminal regulation and protection, which poses a vexing problem for the world’s legal systems, which have had an unsatisfactory track record in protecting valuable information over the course of the previous century, giving rise to the need for laws that specifically address issues related to the protection of the integrity of digital information-storage systems. This Article focuses on the protection of these intangibles, when they are stored within a computer system, from their unauthorized use by, or interference from, third parties.

The Article …

The Protection Of Digital Information And Prevention Of Its Unauthorized Access And Use In Criminal Law, Carrie Leonetti, Moonho Song

Carrie Leonetti

There are a number of valuable intangible properties that do not have specific legislation devoted to their criminal regulation and protection, which poses a vexing problem for the world’s legal systems, which have had an unsatisfactory track record in protecting valuable information over the course of the previous century, giving rise to the need for laws that specifically address issues related to the protection of the integrity of digital information-storage systems. This Article focuses on the protection of these intangibles, when they are stored within a computer system, from their unauthorized use by, or interference from, third parties.

The Article …

Coding For Life--Should Any Entity Have The Exclusive Right To Use And Sell Isolated Dna, Douglas L. Rogers

Douglas L. Rogers

Myriad Genetics, Inc. ("Myriad") obtained patents in the 1990's on two "isolated" human breast and ovarian cancer susceptibility genes ("BRCA"). Myriad did not list all the isolated sequences it claims to have a right to monopolize, but instead claims a patent on the physical phenomena itself -- all DNA segments that code for the BRCA1 polypeptide, even the sequences Myriad has not identified and even someone else in the future creates or isolates the sequences through a method or methods not contemplated by Myriad.

An impressive array of non-profit medical societies, doctors and patients sued to have the Myriad patents …

Novel "Neutrality" Claims Against Internet Platforms: A Reasonable Framework For Initial Scrutiny, Jeffrey Jarosch

Jeffrey Jarosch

This Article examines a recent trend in which the Federal Trade Commission and other enforcement agencies investigate internet platforms for behavior that is insufficiently “neutral” towards users or third parties that interact with the platform. For example, Google faces a formal FTC investigation based on allegations that it has tinkered with search results rather than presenting users with a “neutral” result. Twitter, too, faces a formal investigation after the social media service restricted the ways in which third party developers could interact with Twitter through its application programming interface (API). These investigations represent a new attempt to shift the network …

The Protection Of Digital Information And Prevention Of Its Unauthorized Access And Use In Criminal Law, Carrie Leonetti, Moonho Song

Carrie Leonetti

There are a number of valuable intangible properties that do not have specific legislation devoted to their criminal regulation and protection, which poses a vexing problem for the world’s legal systems, which have had an unsatisfactory track record in protecting valuable information over the course of the previous century, giving rise to the need for laws that specifically address issues related to the protection of the integrity of digital information-storage systems. This Article focuses on the protection of these intangibles, when they are stored within a computer system, from their unauthorized use by, or interference from, third parties.

This Article …

Better Mistakes In Patent Law, Andres Sawicki

Andres Sawicki

This Article analyzes patent mistakes—that is, mistakes made by the patent system when it decides whether a particular invention has met the patentability requirements. These mistakes are inevitable. Given resource constraints, some might even be desirable. This Article evaluates the relative costs of patent mistakes, so that we can make better ones. Three characteristics drive the costs of mistakes: their type (false positive or false negative), timing (early or late), and doctrinal basis (utility, novelty, nonobviousness, and so on). These characteristics make some mistakes more troubling than others. Consider, for example, the disclosure rules, which require that a patent reveal …

Serious Flaw Of Employee Invention Ownership Under The Bayh-Dole Act In Stanford V. Roche: Finding The Missing Piece Of The Puzzle In The German Employee Invention Act, Toshiko Takenaka Prof.

Toshiko Takenaka Prof.

In Stanford v. Roche, the Supreme Court highlighted a serious flaw of employee invention ownership under the Bayh-Dole Act (BDA). This article argues that the current BDA is incomplete without a mechanism for contractors to secure the ownership of all federally funded inventions and proposes a revision to introduce such a mechanism from the German Employee Invention Act (EIA). Because the EIA influenced the drafting of the BDA, the EIA and BDA share key features, which make it easy for the BDA to adopt an ownership transfer mechanism from the EIA. This article also proposes to adopt a mechanism to …

Held Hostage: How The Banking Sector Has Distorted Financial Regulation And Destroyed Technological Progress, Aaron Greenspan

Aaron Greenspan

In 2008, a global financial crisis second only to the Great Depression shed light on the utterly dysfunctional system of financial regulation governing the United States. A cacophony of laws and agencies, charged with regulating retail and investment banks, ultimately failed to prevent (and ultimately accelerated) an epic economic disaster that required enormous taxpayer bailouts of private enterprise, sunk two investment banks (Lehman Brothers and Bear Stearns), imploded an enormous insurance provider (A.I.G.), leveled the American auto industry (General Motors and Chrysler), and destroyed the student loan and mortgage industries, among many, many others. Drafted quickly amidst the wreckage, the …

Did Learned Hand Get It Wrong?: The Questionable Patent Forfeiture Rule Of Metallizing Engineering Co. V. Kenyon Bearing & Auto Parts Co., Dmitry Karshtedt

Dmitry Karshtedt

As Congress stands on the verge of passing patent reform legislation that will grant patent priority to those who are first to file rather than first to invent, an old chestnut of a case penned by Judge Learned Hand some 65 years ago has attracted the attention of lawmakers and commentators. The case of Metallizing Engineering Co. v. Kenyon Bearing & Auto Parts Co. dealt with the thorny problem of granting patents those who have, for some time before patenting, practiced their inventions in secret. The Second Circuit held that one who competitively exploits a secret invention at a time …